The King (Games We Play Book 2)

by Liz Meldon

  So why wasn’t she more excited? Why did it feel like a bus had parked on her chest and refused to budge?

  She swallowed hard and veered away from the elevators, heading for the bathroom instead. No cameras in the bathroom—at least not overlooking the stalls. Once she barricaded herself inside one, she pulled out her phone with shaky hands and fired a quick text to Claude, immediately breaking the rules she’d agreed to only a few minutes prior.

  Hi. Wanted to write and say that I’m fine, but I can’t talk. I think we should take a break for a little while. It isn’t something you did. It’s all me, I promise. And not in the it’s not you, it’s me kind of way. It’s actually me. She hesitated, thumbs hovering over her screen, before replacing break with breather—it sounded less permanent, less serious—before finishing up with: I’m so sorry.

  With the message sent, Delia exhaled deeply and leaned back against the stall door, knocking her head against it a few times before closing her eyes. She wanted to talk to him. Desperately. He was the only person she wanted to talk to about any of this.

  But she knew she had to take a chance on the League this time, when she finally had what she’d been chasing for years. This could propel her up through the ranks and garner the respect she’d always wanted. She’d have the ability to save more lives on higher profile cases. Delia might even be able to make a difference.

  Deep down, however, Delia just wanted to dial Claude’s number and tell him all about it—about the attack at the grocery that had left her battered and bruised and shaken, about how she felt unsafe in her apartment, about the way shadows made her twitchy and the High Council discussed her like she was a thing, that they’d been using her to monitor him. All of it. She needed to unload it all on someone who she knew could take it and give it back frankly without pulling her apart.

  Not wanting to bawl in the bathroom again, Delia left the stall. She washed her hands only because one of the HR girls was there reapplying her lipstick, then left, dragging all the bus in tow and hoping that once the anxiety that had ballooned since the Safe Choice attack lessened, she would finally feel the way she wanted.

  Once she’d calmed down, she might finally be excited about her new prospects, and the feelings she had about her brief romantic dalliance with Claude Grimm would be dwarfed by her new career mobility.

  Right?

  *

  But the excitement never kicked in. Not during weapons training, not during field drills, and not when she met her tactical team. It wasn’t that Delia was completely unhappy. It was a whole new world getting treated like an equal by hunters who generally didn’t give her the time of day—Devin and Ali felt the same way. Low-to middle-ranked hunters were suddenly rubbing elbows with the big dogs. All they did for the last week was train, day in and day out. The social interaction totally boosted her mood, and not once had the High Council called her in for any special assignments. She was just one of the crew now—finally on a team that mattered.

  But Delia wasn’t ecstatic. She didn’t wake up each morning with a spring in her step and a Cheshire grin on her face. The work was tiring. The training was difficult. Claude’s lessons were probably the only reason she could keep up in terms of hand-to-hand combat. For once, her shooting skills were decent in comparison with some of the other hunters—a feat she probably owed to Claude as well. For once, she wasn’t at the bottom of the barrel. For once, Delia stood by awkwardly as a superior chewed somebody else out in front of everyone, stomach knotted because she knew precisely how low that person would feel when it was over. But even that, even the not-being-singled-out thing didn’t do it for her.

  If the excitement hadn’t kicked in during training, it certainly wasn’t going to happen tonight. Whoever had decided that a camping trip to the frigid Harriswood hillside was a good bonding experience for the Donovan Task Force hunters ought to be shot.

  “Did you bring anything for the bonfire?”

  Delia glanced toward the mouth of her tent and spied Devin crouched down outside, his hulking frame filling up most of the opening. She’d been layering up for the cold night ahead, adding an extra sweater and two pairs of socks for good measure. Ali hadn’t left her tent since they arrived, cuddled up next to her portable heater texting Steve with zero intention of joining in on the drunken festivities—and no amount of coaxing from Delia and Devin had made her budge. Kain and his boys were drunk within ten minutes of set-up. Devin had brought all the ingredients for s’mores, while Delia had loaded up two reusable grocery bags with chips.

  They’d already bonded, the lot of them. Every day she’d seen the same faces for hours of drills and training, yet when the High Council instructed them to have a formalized group bonding session the weekend before the big raid, some idiot proposed a camping trip.

  Delia would have been happy with a bar night, but apparently all suggestions paled next to a dozen tents, frigid late-November temperatures, and ten layers of clothes.

  As she stumbled out of her hastily purchased one-man tent, the nippy air making her throat burn, she couldn’t help but wonder if Kain and his boys had had it right from the beginning. She wouldn’t be this cold if she had half a bottle of vodka circulating her system. She made her way over to the roaring bonfire, the flames about as tall as Devin, and found a seat on a log. Devin sidled in beside her, and the pair distributed some of their provisions to the hunters around them. Delia lost her salt and vinegar chips in a heartbeat, so she settled on hoarding the sour cream and onion all to herself.

  Ali eventually joined them, pouting at the cold, with a six-pack of local ale and a cheesecake. Food was devoured. Drinks were had. Laughter encircled the group of hunters around the bonfire, smiles coming easily and jokes flowing freely. It might have been colder than sin, but everyone seemed to be having a good time.

  Delia tried to. There she was, surrounded by people she’d finally clicked with. Good food in her lap. A half-finished bottle of beer by her foot. Body relatively warm under all the layers. No one talked about the mission. No one brought up the Donovan threat or clan politics. For today and tomorrow, they were all just people—not hunters, not scouts, not team leaders. Regular men and women. Coworkers enjoying a little time together.

  Yet Delia wanted the company of one person above all else, and being in this part of the woods was a constant reminder that his home wasn’t actually all that far away.

  She and Claude hadn’t spoken since she’d sent him the we-need-a-break text two weeks prior—and the silence was killing her. Every day she had something she wanted to share with him but couldn’t. Delia wanted to be good. She wanted to focus on being the best hunter she could be with the legitimate opportunity provided for her, yet that proved increasingly difficult when the vampire she was crazy about was on her mind anytime she had a second to breathe.

  Delia missed Claude, and for the first time, she wasn’t afraid to admit it to herself. She missed the smell of his cologne and the crinkle around his eyes when he laughed. She missed his lighthearted jokes. She missed his hand on her lower back, both steering her and letting her lead the way. She missed those bright blues and the feel of his lips.

  Most of all, Delia missed the way he made her feel. Claude made her feel worthy in a way no one else could. He made her feel wanted. He made her feel like she mattered, even if she felt a like screw-up half of the time.

  And she kicked herself that she hadn’t given as much back to him as he had given to her. It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t right, the way she handled things. Claude deserved more than that, even if it meant he broke things off completely.

  She still wasn’t sure when she wanted to tell him that she’d been tasked to spy on him, but that was a decision for another day. Tonight, surrounded by hunters with good food and great beer, Delia realized that this wasn’t where she wanted to be. It was the place she’d always imagined when she pictured her future at the League, but now that she was here, this place didn’t feel like home.

  Claude felt like home.


  The thought struck her so forcefully that she dropped her fork onto her lap, cheesecake crust crumbling across her pants.

  “You okay?” Devin asked over the ruckus. Across the flames, Kain and his boys were singing, their arms stretched across each other’s shoulders as they rocked from side to side—a sight Delia wished she would film. But she wouldn’t. Not now.

  “Yeah,” she said as she stood and dusted herself off. She stepped over the log and placed a hand on Devin’s muscular shoulder, ducking down to speak in his ear. “I have to go do something.”

  His face twisted with mock disgust. “D, if you need to go dig a hole behind the trees, I really don’t need to know about it.”

  “No, I…” She chuckled, a flutter of nerves washing over her. Good nerves. The kind that meant she was actually doing something right for once. “I need to go take care of something. Don’t worry about me. I’ll call if I run into trouble.”

  “What do you…?” He swiveled back on the log as she left him. A few steps away, Delia pointed to the unopened chip bag she’d left.

  “You can have that.”

  With a smile, she set off into the trees, jogging until she reached the road without feeling even slightly winded. From there, it was like following the old path home.

  She swallowed hard as she looked up and down the road to ensure she wasn’t being followed, that there was no one trailing behind to stop her. Nothing in either direction.

  Teeth chattering, Delia hesitated at the hidden driveway to Claude’s manor. But the rustle of the leafless trees and the unflinching moonlight cutting through the thick grey clouds gave her courage, and she pushed onward.

  It was time to stop hiding. It was time to be an actual adult and own up to her mistakes.

  And it was time to kiss Claude again, even if only for a moment.

  CHAPTER 17: Finally

  “Wait here.” The bleach blond vamp gave Delia a once-over, hauntingly dark eyes running up and down her body at his leisure. If she’d been wearing something remotely attractive the stare might have felt sexual. As it were, she had on two pairs of pants, four shirts, and three layers of socks under her cold-weather gear. When he was through, the vamp headed for the door and added, “Try to resist the urge to touch anything.”

  “Sure thing.”

  She watched him close the door, and only when she was alone did she exhale the tension that had hitched a ride from the road to Claude’s front door. There, an unfamiliar vamp had greeted her instead of Claude. It had been odd at first to explain why she was there and who she wanted to see, but once she was in, Delia wondered why she’d expected the Harriswood vampire king to answer his own front door, especially in the middle of the night.

  The vamp with a heavy accent, perhaps German, took her to Claude’s study without much interrogation; apparently he recognized her name.

  Claude’s study was a whole new experience for her, but it wasn’t unlike any study she had been in before. Like many powerful men, Claude had a grand mahogany desk, the woodwork and carvings so intricate—a naval scene with roaring waves and fluttering sails aplenty—that it was quite breathtaking. Two huge windows overlooked the forested area outside, framed with blackout curtains, and a fireplace nestled into the stone wall near the desk, small flames crackling in the hearth. Bookshelves filled with tomes. A thick carpet situated between two leather armchairs. His desk was much more cluttered than she’d expected, with stacks of papers and file folders and opened notebooks scattered across it. The latest Apple desktop sat at the corner, and while Delia wanted to turn the screen for a better look, she did what she’d been told and kept her hands to herself.

  While the walk there had been cold, the wind biting and bitter, Claude’s study was pleasantly toasty, made warmer by all her layers and the small fire. The longer she stood there, the more her body heated. In less than a minute, a thin sheen of sweat had broken out across her forehead. Delia wiped at it with her sleeve, but just as she was about to remove a layer, the door opened behind her.

  There stood Claude, dressed casually in a pair of dark jeans and a black knit sweater. Delia’s gaze swept over him appreciatively, though it stopped when it caught the scowl on his face. Clearing her throat, she clasped her hands together and tried not to fidget too much—an impossible task with the way he looked at her.

  “Hi,” she offered as the silence dragged on. Her voice seemed to rouse him, because moments later he shut the door and crossed the room to stand by his desk, arms folded and scowl fixed. Her eyes followed him as he went, pausing at the windows: it had started to snow. Fat flakes whizzed by the window, caught on the wind.

  Delia swallowed hard as she tore herself away from the view and faced Claude.

  “What are you doing here?” he asked. While his voice wasn’t hostile, it certainly wasn’t friendly. If anything, it was neutral, distant, and it made Delia’s stomach turn.

  She lifted her chin a little, determined not to falter. “I came to see you.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I miss you.” She didn’t have to think about her answer, not for a second. Still, she waited with bated breath for his reaction. Claude’s gaze shifted to the window, and he too seemed taken with the first snowfall of the year. His distraction was temporary, and soon he moved to the fireplace and crouched beside it. Delia watched as he added a few thick pieces of wood from the bin to his right. There he stayed, sparks crackling and jumping as the fire took to the new wood.

  “Did you walk here?” he asked, eyes still fixed to the flames.

  She nodded. “We’re having this…hunter camping retreat thing not far from here. I came from that.”

  “Ah, yes, the one illegally hosted on Grimm property,” he mused, adopting a hardness that didn’t sit well with her. She noted the flicker of his jaw as it clenched and unclenched. “Strange that you would be pitching tents in November.”

  “It wasn’t my idea,” she insisted, dropping her hands to her sides and rubbing her sweaty palms on her pants. Good grief was it ever hot in here. The logical thing would have been to take off her jacket, but Delia thought it might distract from the conversation. “Someone suggested it and everyone jumped at the idea. We usually just get drunk together at a bar. Now they’re all getting drunk in the snow.”

  Delia paused, worried she was rambling. It was then that she caught a fleeting smile on Claude’s lips, one of those little grins that starts suddenly and disappears just as fast. And then the dreadful silence returned, marred only by the spitting fire and the howling wind outside.

  “Look,” she said as she took a few steps toward him, “I’m sorry I’ve been…gone lately, I—”

  “Delia, let me stop you there.”

  He raised his hands as if warming them by the fire, then stood and faced her. With her voice caught in her throat, all she could do was nod.

  “I want to be perfectly frank with you so we’ll have no misunderstandings going forward,” Claude said. Much to her surprise, his voice seemed to catch too. “I’m not interested in being jerked around. I have no desire for a hot and cold relationship.” Delia’s cheeks flamed when their eyes met. “Perhaps it doesn’t seem like it because I’m usually free whenever you want to see me, but I have a life of my own too. I would very much like for you to be a part of it, but only if you’re an active participant. If not, if you’d prefer to jump in and out whenever it suits you, I think it’s best we sever…this.”

  The idea of ending things had never felt so real before. While Wentworth had instructed her to permanently break the ties between her and Claude, she hadn’t seriously considered doing it. But from the expression on his face, Claude had. The noticeable bob of his throat was a mild comfort, as was the way his eyes averted hers and fixed to a place over her shoulder.

  “I am happy to be a friend to you in time,” he told her softly, “but I can’t…” Drawing in a deep breath and letting it out, he shifted his gaze back to her face. “I think I’ve earned more than this,
or, at the very least, some sort of explanation for why you decided to cease all contact with me.”

  She bit her lower lip, holding back what she had to say until he raised an eyebrow at her. Delia sighed. “I can’t tell you that yet.”

  Theoretically she could. If she did, she’d be following Wentworth’s directions precisely: end things. But she wouldn’t do that. Delia didn’t want an ending—she wanted a fresh beginning.

  “I saw the footage of you on the news,” he remarked after a slight pause. “How are you doing after all that?”

  “I was a bit shaken up when it happened.” She shrugged away memories of her scalp injuries, of the nightmares that had plagued her in the nights after. “But I’m fine now, I guess.”

  Outside, the storm pummelled the windows, quickly ramping up, and Delia couldn’t help but think back to the other hunters. Had they retreated into their tents, into their cars? Or did they plan to ride it out in true drunken hunter stubbornness?

  She banished the thought with a few hard blinks, eyes to the floor. The other hunters shouldn’t even be crossing her mind. There were more important things to focus on.

  “So tell me then,” Claude said, his tone forcing her to look up. “Right here, right now… What is it, exactly, that you want?”

  Him. She wanted him.

  Wordlessly, she closed the distance between them in a few strides, placed her hands on his chest, and kissed him. He was a little stiff at first, his arms rigid by his sides and his mouth only just responding to hers. But as Delia tightened her grip on his sweater and pulled her body closer, so many layers of clothing between her and what she wanted, Claude’s hands rose to gently cradle her face. This kiss reminded her of the last they had shared the night of the masquerade: sweet, gentle, cautious. Her eyes fluttered closed as she leaned into him, the warmth of his touch flooding through her body—bringing it to a boiling point.